Great Darwin’s Galapagos!

Hi everyone, Frank N. Foode™ here.
I’m here to answer the call for a de-lurking post, so I thought I would break the ice and show a couple pictures from my recent trip to Madison, Wisconsin, to attend the March Procession of the Species. Humans of all shapes and stripes were dressing up as their favorite species to celebrate the work of Charles Darwin. And here he is – the years have been very kind to Chuck, but I didn’t realize he was so big!

Karl went dressed as a giant ear of corn, and isn’t that a walking pitcher plant in the background?

And here I am with a lovely peacock and a huge dragonfly. Hey aren’t peacocks male – so this is cross-dressing too?
What are some of your favorite species? Here’s a great opportunity to say hi for the first time in the comments – and express some inter-species love!

Hey, that’s nothing to be ashamed about! I recently split my single colony on Sunday and made a nucleus. This weekend I will see if one of the queens have emerged from their cells. Glad to hear your bee interest is buzzing, too!

Karl,
What was this ‘March of the Species’ all about? I keep seeing articles claiming 1,800+ species go extinct every year, but nobody seems to know which ones. On the other hand, it’s quite quantifiable how many new species are discovered each year — and rediscovered after being declared extinct.

No shame, just tired 🙂 . A bit of a surprise, though. I tried splitting and actually ended up rehiving them in a second hive twice, but they decided to go off on their own. I may try some tracking later this summer for grins to see if I can find them. They were strange swarm anyway. Ended up in the grass under the hive, initially.
Pdiff

It was actually the Procession of the Species (this is what happens when I let an ear of corn blog), intended to highlight species diversity on or about the summer solstice, as I gathered. Here is their site. It was very hippie – might be a great place to do some outreach in the future to highlight inter-species affairs. 🙂

I ♥ Chuck. I got to talk about him yesterday at the NIH. We were doing software training there, and my screen cap of one of the sites has a big photo of him on it….
I’m agnostic on species. I like them all. Yes, even some of those nasty viruses.